From the recording Threadbare Songs
The @wildwoodrecording song contest prompt for week 50 is to write a song about the cold.
Sometimes the cold feels safer than the cure. We stay numb because "thawing out" actually hurts, like blood rushing back into frozen hands. It stings, it burns, and it wakes us up.
I wrote this one about the temptation to stay frozen and the terrifying, messy work of letting grace warm you up again.
This is "Sting Like Home." It’s a little threadbare and rough around the edges, but so am I. Hope it speaks to you.
Lyrics
VERSE 1
My gloves are soaked through to the bones in my fingers
They burn from the cold of perpetual winter
Ice forming armor, protecting my skin
From arrows and enemies that try to break in
And I’m hoping my ache will be buried in snow
It’s a lonely existence to stand in the cold
CHORUS
So don't offer me fire, don't open the door
I don’t think that I’m ready to feel anymore
The wind blows a merciful line of defense
Where the past is still threatening in present tense
VERSE 2
With a whisper of love on the warmth of your breath
You speak a rebuke to the shadow of death
And the winter wind listens, the temperature rises
Insatiable flames are now burning inside me
I want to return to the cold that I’ve known
Where the hurt is familiar and the sting feels like home
BRIDGE
But I take off the gloves and I stare at my hands
They’re shaking and red like they don’t understand
But your grace isn't poison, it's blood rushing back
Filling in fissures and healing the cracks
END CHORUS
Please build me a fire, and open the door
I don’t want to stand in the cold anymore
The wind was a clever, deceitful illusion
But grace is a flame burning through my confusion